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Banks are carrying more bad loans while the state runs a heavy deficit — the combination that has historically preceded frozen deposits, bank rescues, and withdrawal limits. These are warning signals, not a forecast: the outcome depends on cushions the data cannot see, from bank capital to outside support. The personal risk worth preparing for is temporarily losing access to your own money.
Time to act once this fires: 1-3 weeks
Split money across banks so each stays under the deposit-insurance ceiling. Keep part of your reserve in a bank headquartered in another country, plus some cash at home. Know your deposit-insurance limit and what it actually covers. Avoid long fixed-term deposits while the status is elevated — liquidity beats an extra percent.
Stay under the deposit-insurance ceiling in every bank
Deposit insurance repays you if a bank fails — but only up to a ceiling per person per bank. Find your country's limit, add up everything you hold in each bank (accounts, deposits, cards), and move whatever sits above the ceiling to another bank. This one afternoon of work removes most of the risk.
Open a reserve account outside the stressed system
When a banking system freezes, every local bank tends to freeze the same way. An account with a bank headquartered in another country — even with a modest sum — gives you a door that still opens. Set it up while everything is calm; during a crisis such accounts become hard to open.
Keep enough cash for two to four weeks
Withdrawal limits usually appear overnight, and card payments can fail with the banks. Keep two to four weeks of family expenses in cash at home — enough to live normally while the situation clears, not so much that losing it would hurt badly.
The macro conditions that define this scenario. Because some markers apply only to certain countries, how much each one adds to a score depends on the country — a country's own page shows its exact split. Weighting is relative: ×2 counts twice as much as ×1.
| Indicator | Alarm line | Weighting |
|---|---|---|
| Bank non-performing loans to total gross loans (IMF FSI, quarterly)only for 26 countries | above 10%, for 2 periods in a row | ×2 |
| General government net lending/borrowing to GDP (IMF WEO) | below -6% | ×1 |
| Country stock index vs its 200-day average (Moscow Exchange)only for RUS | below -15%, for 5 periods in a row | ×2 |
| Exchange rate, local currency per US dollar (daily)only for RUS | a rise of more than 15% above its recent low, for 5 periods in a row | ×2 |
Markers tagged “only for” use a data source that exists for those countries alone — every other country's score is computed without them, so they never dilute or affect anyone else.